NEITI: Nigeria Earned Zero Revenue From Solid Minerals In Q3 2017

Nigeria earned no revenue into her Federation Account from its solid minerals sector in the first nine months of 2017, a quarterly review of revenues that went into the account by the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) has disclosed.

The quarterly review contained information on disbursements made to the three tiers of government – federal, state and local, from the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) for the third quarter of 2017, as well as on mid-year budget implementation between January and September 2017.

It said its findings were based on its analysis of data obtained from the FAAC, National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Federal Ministry of Finance and the Budget Office of the Federation, adding that while the federal government to get N1.061 trillion from oil revenues, it only got N414 billion, but nothing from the solid minerals sector.

The review report stated that N4.545 trillion was disbursed as FAAC allocations between January and September 2017 by the three tiers of government.
Out of this amount, it said N1.757 trillion was shared in the third quarter of 2017 as against the N1.377 trillion and N1.411 trillion that were disbursed in the second and first quarters of the year.

“Budgeted half-year inflows from the oil sector was N1.061 trillion but actual oil inflows to the federal government was N414 billion. The federal government’s budget estimated half-year non-oil revenue inflows at N705 billion but realised only N352 billion, indicating a 49 per cent shortfall,” said the report.

It explained that: “All sources of oil revenues with the exception of rents recorded positive improvements in 2017 than 2016 first halves. The same goes for the non – oil sector revenues where Value Added Tax (VAT) was the largest contributor to the revenues with a 16 per cent increase over 2016 figures.
“There was no revenue recorded from solid minerals and dividends from investments funded by FAAC despite the abundant solid minerals deposits in the country.”

The report attributed the rise in VAT collections to increase in economic activities, expansion in the tax base and the improvement in performance of revenue collecting agencies.
It also said that actual revenue for the first half of the year fell short of projections, adding: “Actual oil revenue was N1.587 trillion, representing a shortfall of N1.079 trillion, implying a 40.4 per cent under performance.

“Non-oil revenue fared slightly worse, as only 41.6 per cent of the projected revenue was realized. Actual non-oil revenue totaled N1.125 trillion, indicating a shortfall of N1.575 trillion.”
The report also pointed out that while government projected that the non – oil sector would outperform the oil sector, the oil sector performed better by as much as 41 per cent in revenues generation raking in N1.587 trillion as against N1.125 trillion for the non-oil sector.